Ring on her Finger
by Lindz
Summary: Why did Rude become a Turk? Here's his story....


** Ring on her Finger**

I come up with way too many different pasts for the characters of FF 7. Here's another Rude POV, on why he became a Turk. Nothing to do with 'Never Trusting Soul' at all, totally different past.

* * *

Same old mission. Same objectives. Someone else would be dead by the end of the night. Do I care? At one time I would have, but not anymore. If something can take away the most precious things in life away from me, I have every right to do the same back, right? I think so anyway.

So here I'm stood, leaning against a wall in Sector Two, waiting for Reno to come out of the bar with whoever we were supposed to 'bump off'. Someone who had no family, who no one would miss. This was probably one of the easier people to get rid of. Sometimes, rarely, but sometimes we'd get a guy who would look as innocent as a little school girl. He'd have a family and all. And then........... well you get the idea.

Why'd I join the Turks you ask? Same reason most people do. I had no one left to care about. It was either a Turk or a bounty hunter and Turks get paid more for less trouble. I think all of us in the Turks have lost someone we care about to something that we could have stopped, that shouldn't have really happened.

For Reno, it was his little girl. She caught the stray bullet from a shoot out, smack bang between the eyes. He never forgave himself for leaving her for two minutes. He told me his girlfriend died in child birth and instead of giving the kid away, like any normal slum born kid would, he kept her. He says now he wished he hadn't, coz maybe she still be alive today.

For Tseng, it was his sister. For some reason or another, during the Wutai-Shinra war, she got labeled a traitor to Wutai. In reality she'd done nothing wrong. She was killed by her own country. After that Tseng vowed never to set foot there again. Came to Midgar, ended up working for the opposite side.

For me? Well lets say I lost something I don't think I'll ever find again. 

I had a cushy life. I lived in Mideel. My old man had a weapons shop there, selling all kinds of Shinra made weapons, since they were still a Weapons Manufacturer at the time. I helped him out whenever he needed it, for a little money. My Ma stayed at home like the good little house wife. I'm not faulting her though, she enjoyed it, always smiling.

The town was quite, nothing major ever happened. There were no gangs, no major crime, only the petty shop lifting kid who'd get grounded for his troubles. Life was peaceful.

I learnt how to do a few kinds of martial arts. At the time it was just something to do to pass the time. I enjoyed it, gave me some kind of power I didn't think I had.

Best of all, I had Anita. Complete with the ring on her finger.

* * *

"Rude!"

I heard the call from the shop doorway. I looked up from the shelf I was stacking and smiled.

"Hey Ani."

I watched her smile as she walked towards me and hung her arms around my neck.

"How's my man this beautiful morning?" She asked in a sweet, playful tone. Anita was the kind of person you couldn't hate. Her good mood always wiped off on everyone.

"I'm fine now you're here." I told her.

"Of course you are silly. Hi Mr Brooks." I assumed she was talking to my father who had probably walked out the back room.

"Hi Anita. How's your mother and father?" He asked politely. 

"They're good. They ask the same about you."

"We're fine." I watched him smile. "Are you going to let my son get anything done today?" He asked in jest.

"I dunno about that Mr Brooks." She joked back. I watched as my old man laughed and went back into the backroom. "You haven't forgotten about tonight have you?" She asked me. How could I forgot about tonight? She'd been reminding me every day for the past three weeks. Her parents were coming to town. Anita actually came from a little village called Ma'dess just north-east of Mideel. Took about a days drive to get there. Anita's parents didn't come to town a lot.

"What about tonight?" I decided to joke with her. She scowled playfully and slapped my shoulder lightly.

"I'll not get mad, coz I know for a fact you're jestin' with me." She leaned up and gave me a sweet lingering kiss, then smiled. "I'll see you at six then."

"Sure." I answered as she left the shop.

***

It was about four o'clock when the tremors started. Mideel was known for being on a fault line. Everyone knew about the green stuff underneath the town, but no one knew what it was. We always called it greter, although I have no idea why. Maybe because it was a mixture of 'green' and 'water', probably something really simple like that. Sometimes, the greter would make an appearance on the surface whenever we had tremors, this time was one of them. 

What happened that day was surreal, I've never seen anything like it, or ever will do again.

I was leaning on the door of the shop, minding my own business as I felt the first tremor. I saw Anita walking across town in a light yellow summer dress. I could see her smiling and everything. There was another tremor, this one twice as bad as the one before. I watched as she lost her balance and fell in a heap on the ground. Just as a pushed myself off the doorway to go and help her, a huge tremor ripped through the town. 

There used to be a water tower smack bang in the middle of town, like the one in Nibelheim. Anita was about ten foot away from it. As the earthquake carried on, I saw the tower start to tip, like it was in slow motion. 

"Anita! Move!" I can remember myself shouting as I ran towards where she was sat. I saw her look at the water tower, pure terror on her face. She didn't move, she probably couldn't move. I tired to run faster, but there was no way I could get there before the tower hit the ground. Water gushed everywhere. The greter erupted from the ground, covering everywhere. I felt myself stand stock still. As the water and greter cleared, I could see Anita laying on the ground.

They told me she died instantly. I couldn't help but feel it was my fault. My parents kept telling me it wasn't, but I knew deep down I should have run faster.

My whole life had just turned upside down in the space of ten seconds. She was gone. My love, my soul mate was gone for good. I felt like she'd ripped half of my soul with her when she went. I knew I'd never feel like that about someone ever again. I don't like the dwell on the fact very much. I don't need to put myself through that again.

***

It was this incident that let Shinra to discover what they now call 'Mako'. Shinra guards, scientists and whoever else they decided they needed were roaming the town for weeks after. They told the mayor that if they let them experiment on the 'green liquid' for a few weeks, they would leave the town well and truly alone. Surprisingly they kept to that promise. They even helped rebuild the part of town that had perished, but the water tower never went back up.

I remember being sat on a large rock near the entrance of the town about a week after the earthquake, smoking a cigarette. /She/ had made me stop, but of course the first thing I did when she died was smoke again. 

"Mind if we sit 'ere?" I heard a Midgarian accent just in front of me. I never looked up, just nodded lightly. I heard them sit down, gathered without looking up that there were two of them.

I could feel one of them staring at me, so I looked up.

"Looks like you've got the whole world on your shoulders, don't it boss?" I listened to the redhead drawl out.

"I don't think it's any of your business Reno." The black haired Wutian told him. He turned to me. "Ignore him, he doesn't know where not to stick his nose in."

"I do too." The man named Reno retorted. "You know fuck Tseng. I bet it was a welcome intrusion, am I right?" 

I looked at him for a moment. "Not really." 

Reno scoffed. "I bet I can get it out of ya in the next ten minutes." He went silent for a while. "Did someone ya know die in this?" I left myself flinch slightly, the redhead caught it. "Who?" He asked.

"Don't really wanna talk about it." I mumbled.

"Reno, leave the poor guy alone." The man named Tseng interrupted. "You have my permission to smack him one if he carries on." 

I smiled ever so slightly.

"Who was it then? Parents, sister, brother?" He carried on. I didn't say anything. "Girlfriend, fiancé?" I flinched again. "Ah." He said as if he knew what it was like. 

"What do you mean ah?" I had to ask. Reno just looked at me, taking a drag of his cigarette.

"I mean what I said, ah."

"What would you know?" I mumbled more to myself than him. He answered anyway.

"You need to pack all the memories into a nice little bag and store it at the back of your head where you can't reach it." He told me.

For reasons unknown to me, even now, I smacked him one right in the jaw. He fell off the rock with a thud. I saw Tseng almost smile, as Reno got up with a scowl on his face, rubbing his jaw. The scowl faded.

"Shit, you've got one hell of a punch man." He told me. I watched as some of the Shinra blues around the entrance of the town looked our way. They were looking at us as if a fight was going to break out. I took no notice of them, lighting another cigarette in a long line that I knew I would smoke.

"I'm not going to tell you that you didn't deserve that Reno." Tseng spoke. 

"You'd stick up for anyone who's not me."

"I would."

"Gesh, you're supposed to be my mate aren't you?" Reno asked, still rubbing his jaw.

"Boss first, mate later. You deserved that anyway." Tseng smirked. He turned to me. "Where did you learn to punch like that?"

"I know a few martial arts, that kinda thing." I muttered. He left it at that. He waited till the redhead had thrown his cigarette end on the floor, then spoke again. "C'mon."

"We'll see you again sometime." Reno said to me.

"Who exactly are you anyway?" I asked before I thought before he turned away. Reno smirked and pointed to himself and Tseng.

"You're looking at the whole division known as the Manufacturing Department of Administrative Research." Then he turned and walked away. Anyone would have to be deaf and blind to not know who the Manufacturing Department of Administrative Research were. Even though they went by the name the Turks most of the time. I watched as the two of them talked, then Tseng proceed to whack Reno round the back of the head. I shook my head and returned to my cigarette.

***

I left Mideel soon after that. I couldn't stop there. My parents didn't want me to go, but they didn't stop me. I left and went to Midgar. Midgar was a place I'd only heard things about until then, though none of the stories compared to the real thing.

I had enough money to get an apartment on the plate. My parents had insisted I take some of the money they had been saving with me. I knew they wouldn't let me go without it, so I took it. It was a tiny place, barely enough room for one, but less to clean. I liked it. I found the savings I had dwindling, so I decided to go and waste the rest of it at a bar.

To make a long story short, I was sat at a bar in Sector Six one night, nursing my usual shot of vodka, when a bar fight broke out. I could never stand petty fighting between drunks, it was just the most childish thing. I calmly stood up and whacked the nearest one round the head. Too drunk to avoid it, the man went down straight away, out cold. The other one was too surprised to retaliate, so I calmly whacked him one too.

Out the corner of my eye, I saw a red haired man rise from his hiding place behind the bar. He looked familiar. 

"Hey thanks, you did my job for me."

I looked at him. I think we both clicked on who the other was at the same time. He beat me to speaking first.

"You're that guy who socked me in the jaw in Mideel."

"And your a Turk." I said. He grinned, then put two fingers to his lips and whistled the loudest I've ever heard anyone whistle. A dozen Shinra Blues ran into the bar. Reno pointed to the two men on the floor.

"Take 'em to HQ."

"Yes Sir." One of the guards saluted and ran of to do his job. Reno walked up to me and slung an arm around my shoulders, leading me out the bar.

"So..." He drawled out when we were outside. "I need a partner, Tseng's a stuck up ass. Interested?" He asked.

* * *

... and that's how I became a Turk. Not the most interesting way, but still. That was nearly six years ago. 

I still miss Anita, but it doesn't hurt as much to think about her now as it did then. I've learned over the years that the world isn't the nicest place to be born into, maybe it's better off this way. At least she doesn't need to suffer with what this world can throw at you.

I heard a gun shot, then a loud whistle. Some Shinra Blues scuttled into the bar. Reno came out a few second later, holstering a gun into the pouch on his belt. He looked at me.

"What's up with you?"

"Just thinking." 

"About what?" He pressed on. We started walking away from the bar.

"About the time I socked you one in the jaw." I told him, a little smirk on my face. He laughed then gave me a push. I didn't move very far. I pushed him back and he went flying. I couldn't keep a straight face as he did a fancy forward roll to stop himself falling over ungracefully. He stood back up quickly and scowled in the exact same way he did after I punched him.

"Where would a Turk be without your sense of humour everyday Rude?" He said, his scowl fading into a smirk.

"What sense of humour?" I told him. He laughed. 

"C'mon, how's about going to a nice bar for a drink?"

"Yeah."

I guess I'll never know what my life would have been like if Anita never died. But for now, I'd like to think she's happy where she is. Whatever the afterlife is like, I hope she still has that ring on her finger. 

I realised I'd stopped walking.

"Rude! C'mon man." Reno shouted impatiently.

"Yeah Reno I'm coming."

* * *

Lindz ~ 21st March 2003


End file.
